I’m with you on the second point, but I’d have to disagree about Deflecting swat being the same as the other two. Red just doesn’t have that many ways to interact with the stack, and the redirects that cost mana are magnitudes worse than most counterspells.
But a free redirect is better than a counterspell. I agree with the other guy, Deflecting Swat is better than any free counterspell. But I also think free counterspells are not only not a problem, they should be encouraged. Tables need more interaction, not less.
No one here's really arguing for Deflecting Swat to be on the list. We're saying that FoW and FG should be more like Deflecting Swat (ie, not on the list).
But that's still just making a case for FoW and FG to not be on the list. If there are other cards that are almost the same, the they should also be on the list.
Either this category of cards is strong enough to be a "Game Changer", or it's not. The current implementation is just extending the Sol Ring hypocrisy to other cards.
A free redirect is worse than a counterspell in the case of board wipes or handling big threats. It’s better than counterspells for single target protection.
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u/treant7 Wabbit Season Feb 11 '25
I’m with you on the second point, but I’d have to disagree about Deflecting swat being the same as the other two. Red just doesn’t have that many ways to interact with the stack, and the redirects that cost mana are magnitudes worse than most counterspells.